Today was the final day of a 3 day promotion where The Reborn – the first part of my technothriller novel series – was free on Amazon. After fantastic results on Day 1, then declining (yet still pleasing) results on Day 2, I expected Day 3 to continue the waning trend. But that’s not what happened.
Here are final numbers from the end of each day, with some sales and rank comparisons to just before The Reborn went free. Note that none of the books were ranked in any lists before the promo, aside from the all-inclusive “Kindle Store” rank.
Total Copies Purchased During 3-Day Promo
The Reborn: 8,553 (free) Of Mice and Hitmen: 114 (includes 3 lending library borrows) The Spiritual Singularity: 52
Day 3 Was an Uptick
Rather than slowing down, Day 3 was a minor uptick. Day 2 and 3 combined did slightly better than Day 1 by itself. And since Day 1 went great, I see Days 2 and 3 as a success. I’m glad to have chosen a 3-day promo rather than cutting it off after Day 2.
So what changed? Why did Day 3 go better than expected? Here’s my speculation:
It was Sunday. More people buy books on Sundays. Saturdays are actually the worst day for selling books, and Mondays are the best. (See this post on novelrank.com.)
New Free List Visibility. The Reborn finally got posted on Free Kindle Books and Tips, which has a curated list of free Kindle books and boasts 350,000+ readers. (A small % of whom may have seen The Reborn in the listings.)
Key Points about the Promotion Stats
8,553 people downloaded The Reborn. (I’d had less than 100 sales previous to this giveaway.) That’s an incredible number with tons of potential for reviews, word of mouth, and the possibility of getting hooked into the series.
The promo significantly affected Of Mice and Hitmen (Part 2 of the series) and The Spiritual Singularity (Part 3 of the series). I sold more over the promo period than in the 5 months following publication on Amazon.
During the promo, Part 2 sold at a rate 105x higher than before. Part 3 sold 64x higher. This is despite raising the price of Part 3 from $0.99 to $2.99 during the first promo day (I felt this was a better price).
The overall rank in the Kindle store for Part 2 & 3 jumped dramatically.
Parts 2 & 3 got into the Top 50 Best Seller lists for 2 versions of the Technothriller category (Kindle and Books), where previously neither had been ranked in those lists at all. Part 2 finished with ranks 16 & 17 in those lists.
Takeaways
Amazon’s free promotional days are definitely worth using. (And preparation helps – see my Day 1 post.)
I’m glad I stuck with 3 days rather than just doing 2 days, since sales increased on day 3. Also, having the promo over both week days and weekend days was ideal, and reached both weekend and weekday readers.
What made this promo even more worthwhile and effective is that I already had other books available. It was especially effective that these other two books were part of the series that The Reborn kicked off.
Looking Ahead
I’m writing this at 11:00 PM the night after the promotion ended, so I’ve been able to observe its short term after-effects, which have been good. Rather than fading back to obscurity, sales and discovery remained solid.
Here are the numbers:
The Reborn sold more copies in a single post-promo day than it had sold in the past two months combined, it gained spots in the regular best seller lists for technothrillers (as opposed to the free best seller lists), and borrows from the lending library rose. Also, sales of the sequels remained bolstered.
All in all, these free book days have been fantastic. I'm supremely happy with the results.
Looking forward, there’s clearly plenty of room for growth. When will I be (more) satisfied? I’m not sure, but it involves a lot more people reading and enjoying The Day Eight Series. (And maybe an, “I told you so,” when the story in the books comes true ; )
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